In an era where the young adult fiction aimed at teen girls concerns itself with such pressing problems as how to dissuade your vampire boyfriend from performing cunnilingus when you're having your period, it's difficult to remember that author Judy Blume was once considered shocking or controversial. It's almost quaint to reflect on Blume's oeuvre when you put it on the shelf alongside current titles like OMG I Sucked A Lot Of Cock At Sandy's Party or Bent Over At The Ass Olympics: Diary Of A Teenage Girl, Book 3. But Blume can still inspire outrage from those on the other end of the culture wars: a recent solicitation for donations made on behalf of Planned Parenthood resulted in the author receiving a torrent of hate mail. (Planned Parenthood, wisely, used the attack to raise even more funds.)
Los Angeles Times columnist Meghan Daum, reflecting on the commotion, raises an interesting point:
Well, is she? The fact that the people who actually respond to the name "Judy Blume" are approaching menopause themselves may indicate that she is. I don't have an answer either way, though; I've just been trying to figure out a way to work that line about "vampire cunnilingus" into a post for a couple days now, and I'll be damned if I'm going to let an opportunity like this pass me by.
Like Blume, who is one of the most beloved and most censored American authors of the last few decades, Planned Parenthood occupies a clear position on the post-Roe cultural map. Generally speaking, if you're on board with abortion rights, you're on board with Planned Parenthood. If you're pro-life, the organization is the headquarters of Godlessness. And while there are surely Blume fans who don't favor legalized abortion, it's easy to see why Planned Parenthood enlisted her as a fundraiser. An icon of 1970s-era feminism and its efforts on behalf of sex education and women's health, she elicits certain nostalgia for the early days of the fight that makes pro-choicers want to keep fighting today.
But in seeing this saga unfold in my inbox, I was struck by a troubling question. Even though Blume may not be associated with abortion in and of itself (none of her protagonists ever got one), is there something about her persona that signals a lack of dispassion about its ramifications? Is she reminding people of a time when, in the relief of Roe being decided, there was a cultural perception that abortion was a simple procedure that needn't come with attendant emotional baggage?
I really enjoyed her "Ramona Quimby, Age Barely 18" and "Return of Superfudge-packer".
Ramona Quimby's Beverly Cleary, Colonel. Blume was too busy writing Fudge-a-mania.*
*Which is an actual book.
That explains it. Cleary was such a perverted whore.
That OMG I Sucked a Lot of Cock book is actually quite a good read.
And it really holds up over many readings.
Are You There, God? It's Me, Margaret Cho
I will see your "vampire cunnilingus" and raise you "vampire who pulls a tampon out of a real life vagina with his teeth and then drinks from it." because that totally happened in a mid-90's anne rice book. there isn't enough therapy/comet cleanser in the world that could remove that from my brain.
You Are Not There, God
Huh. I just actually read your post? But still not the column it references? And I would like to go ahead and say that I was not aware there was a time when abortion was considered simple and non-emotional.
Jesus Christ, this post had my officemate and I in tears.
Having received both of these emails, I would like to add that PParenthood, God bless 'em, needs to ease the RPMs on their email list down a bit as they are wearing out their welcome with some (me) of their once-donors by sending OBAMA POLICY EMERGENCY email like every third day.
Vampire cunnilingus is the new graveside bukkake.